[Python-Dev] dict(keys, values)

[Steve Holden]

Brian Quinlan wrote:
> George Sakkis wrote:
>> Perhaps this has been brought up in the past but I couldn't find it in
>> the archives: far too often I use the idiom dict(zip(keys,values)), or
>> the same with izip. How does letting dict take two positional
>> arguments sound ?
>>
>> Pros:
>> - Pretty obvious semantics, no mental overhead to learn and remember it.
>> - More concise (especially if one imports itertools just to use izip).
>> - At least as efficient as the current alternatives.
>> - Backwards compatible.
>>
>> Cons:
> - Yet Another Way To Do It
> - Marginal benefit
> 
> Also note that the keyword variant is longer than the zip variant e.g.
> 
>    dict(zip(keys, values))
>    dict(keys=keys, values=values)
> 
> and the relationship between the keys and values seems far less obvious 
> to me in the keyword variant.
> 
Unfortunately

   dict(keys=keys, values=values) == {keys: values}

regards
  Steve
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